Swipely now managing $1B in payments

Swipely, a Providence-based firm offering merchant payments processing paired with customer analytics, said Tuesday it's now managing more than $1 billion in annual sales for merchants.

The announcement comes a year after Swipely expanded from providing a card-linked customer loyalty service to becoming a full-blown payments processor — and one that, according to founder and CEO Angus Davis, can offer payments data to merchants in a way legacy processors can't.

Swipely earns revenue by receiving a small portion of every transaction processed by its system. The firm is competing with major payments processors such as Heartland Payment Systems and First Data, and says its system is ideal for merchants that accept at least $30,000 in monthly credit card sales.

Swipely says it is now managing payments for merchants across 29 states.

In May, the company said it had raised a $12 million Series B round led by Shasta Ventures to expand its network of merchants and accelerate its nationwide growth.

Also taking part in the round were First Round Capital, Greylock Partners and Index Ventures. The firm has now raised $20.5 million since its founding in 2009.